Subscribe

Common Core Goes Global

The philosophy in the school room in one generation will become the philosophy of government in the next. — Abraham Lincoln

[A]t the request of educators I wrote the World Core Curriculum, the product of the United Nations, the meta-organism of human and planetary evolution. — Robert Muller, former U.N. Assistant Secretary General

The education reform known as Common Core State Standards (CCSS) for grades K-12, adopted by forty plus states and more than half of the U.S. dioceses, is designed to produce a universal “work force ready” population prepared to self-identify as “global citizens.” Many education professionals have been critical of CCSS. But even they may not know the philosophical reason why financiers like Bill Gates have bankrolled the Common Core system. The same sources of funding for Common Core in the United States are promoting similar methods and aligned texts world wide through the auspices of the United Nations.

In Crisis, readers learned that Common Core is financed with over $150 million from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The collaboration of the Gates Foundation and the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has been well publicized. In addition, Gates, on behalf of his Microsoft Corporation, signed a 26-page Cooperation Agreement in 2004 between Microsoft and UNESCO to develop a “master curriculum” which included benchmarks and assessments. The agreement stipulates that “UNESCO will explore how to facilitate content development.”

Some have decried Common Core as the nationalization of American education. Far more dangerous, however, is the globalism of Common Core that demotes American values, undermines American constitutional principles and detaches students from their families and faith. Common Core is simply the newest attempt in the decades-old battle (Outcome Based Education, Goals 2000) to impose a U.N. globalist worldview aimed at “peace,” sustainability and economic stability at the expense of freedom.

Briefly, the globalist philosophy calls for the establishment of a global culture based on a commitment to sustainable processes and humanistic ethics to ensure world peace and “fair” distribution of natural resources. The U.N. serves as the hub for this globalist hope. Adherents believe that some form of world congress and world citizenship is the end point of political evolution, and, therefore it is inevitable. What is not certain, in their view, is the time of fulfillment.

Those who hold this philosophy are passionate—they fear that unless a form of world convergence of mind and political will arrives very soon, the planet may fail from wars, global warming and similar threats. Pick up popular magazines and you’ll find “world leaders,” celebrities and pundits who espouse some version of globalism. How would globalism work at ground level?

A nation is permitted to keep its surface culture, such as language, music, and cuisine. But patriotism, religion, and individualism are anathema, as each competes with the globalist vision of world harmony. Moral codes that cannot be adapted to a multicultural vision, agreed upon in a world congress, must be jettisoned.

But back on the ground, it’s difficult to convince a people to abandon their country and culture, not to mention national resources; resistance would be too great. The quickest effective approach is to invest in education to ensure that the coming generation will embrace the principles of globalism as a natural consequence of their formation.

Previous Crisis articles have detailed the lack of academic rigor of CCSS for both math and English Language Arts. Teachers have reported disturbing “aligned texts” that contain crude, sexually explicit reading selections for young teens. Parents have questioned multiple examples of anti-American sentiment (the Boston Tea Party as a terrorist attack, for example). Despite this outcry, Common Core defenders insist that the standards are necessary, even though it only prepares students for admission to junior college. If the standards are substandard, why are hundreds of millions of Gates and other foundation monies, as well as over a billion dollars in government carrots, being pumped into this ‘transformation” of education? The goal is not academic excellence, but to reconstruct the nations of the world into a new, interdependent model. Their educational model is aimed at an economically stable world with “workforce ready” workers who share the same globalist vision.

How do you enter the “minds of men” for this reconstruction? The quickest route to a transformed society is through education. The U.N.’s Millennium Development Goals, adopted in 2000, include universal education, under the auspices of UNESCO. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the primary public face of Common Core, prizes its partnership with UNESCO to insure global standards for educating tomorrow’s labor force via Education for All (EFA).

Another champion of CCSS and UNESCO is Arne Duncan, U.S. Secretary of Education. Duncan addressed UNESCO in 2010 on “transformational education”:

And transformational reform especially takes time in the United States…. That goal can only be achieved by creating a strong cradle-to-career continuum that starts with early childhood learning and extends all the way to college and careers.

Duncan discussed Common Core as a means to reconstruct education in the United States, and noted the increased role of the federal government in education. Duncan acknowledged the need for America to learn from other nations. He restated President Obama’s commitment to international cooperation for economic viability: “Any world order that elevates one nation or group of people over another will inevitably fail.”

Existing national models must be deconstructed for this global transformation to occur. UNESCO began the deconstruction of national education systems in 1949 with a pamphlet, “Towards a World Understanding, Vol.V: In the Classroom with Children Under Thirteen Years of Age” (Paris, 1949). The pamphlet states, “As long as the child breathes the poisoned air of nationalism, education in world-mindedness can only produce precarious results…. The school should therefore use the means described earlier to combat family attitudes…” (p. 54-5).

A similar sentiment permeates other Common Core aligned texts. Concepts found in grade school children’s textbooks such as justice and equality are given politically biased meanings. Justice is newly defined to mean the redistribution of wealth and resources. Equality is used to dismantle preference for one’s own culture, religion and social customs. “Predictive information,” data ostensibly gathered on each student to improve performance, is in truth a measurement of a student’s adjusted attitude and behavior—a Soviet style “managed outcome.”

The Russian model, in fact, is codified in the US agreement to the Moscow Declaration, which states: “Ministers recognized that the internationalization of education is a reality.” The agreement U.S. officials signed calls for a program, “…implemented by education ministers of all the world countries and international organizations, including the World Bank, UNESCO, and UN” (ITAR-TASS, 6-2-2006). The U.S. Department of Education said the member delegates “pledged to share best practices across borders” to build “education systems that can allow people … to live and contribute to a global society, and to work in a global economy” (U.S. Dept. of Education, 6-2-2006).

U.N. affiliated organizations, the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the World Bank also reflect UNESCO’s vision. Loans are made and trade preferences are granted to those nations or entities that promote “twenty-first century thinking.” Most chilling is that UNESCO fronts the implementation of the U.N. plan known as Agenda 21. Enacted in 1992, Agenda 21 strives to “reorient” the world’s education systems to achieve sustainable development: “Both formal and non-formal education are indispensable to changing people’s attitudes … and behaviour consistent with sustainable development” (# 36.2).

And now we arrive back at Gates’s agreement with UNESCO. EFA contains repeated units on collectivism, shared goals and sustainable development as does CCSS. Note this passage from the EFA’s Global Monitoring Report:

It is crucial that education stakeholders are well positioned … in advancing a wide range of other development goals. The GMR will provide Policymakers … stakeholders with powerful new evidence to show why it is crucial that equitable learning be given its rightful place at the centre of the post 2015 global development architecture. It will identify the types of reforms in teaching and learning that are needed to promote transformative change.

Academia, public policy institutes and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) promote this globalist vision. One particularly noteworthy recent example comes from Oxford University where the Oxford Martin School Commission released a report on October 16. The purpose of the Commission is to “anticipate the consequences of our collective actions, and influence policy and behaviour accordingly.” A pre-publication statement by Commission chairman, Pascal Lamy, former Director General of the WTO, repeated the mantra, “The ability to address today’s global challenges is undermined by the absence of a collective vision for society. We urge leaders to establish shared global values….”

These lofty sentiments of transnational corporations and associations have influenced American school districts for years. For example, one can point to the 2008 Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents position paper, “Global Education: A Call to Action.” In it we read:

[M]obility of populations fuel renewed calls for mutual understanding and appreciation on a global scale … Global education, when seen through this lens, is more about understanding, cooperation, and world peace. [Schools are to] [i]nclude expanded treatment of global concepts in the next revision of the curriculum frameworks in social studies [and] [p]rovide resources to educators to promote the integration of global concepts into the curriculum.

Common Core exemplars and aligned texts are designed to cause disorientation for the American child by de-emphasizing national cultural identity. At home he learned to be proud of his country, to respect the flag and the Constitution, but under CCSS the child will find few positive images of America. Of the texts suggested for kindergarten and first grade none teach the concept of freedom, or offer a song (America the Beautiful?) or any story praising heroes of the American Revolution. Children of this age naturally want to love family and friends, discover a sense of belonging and develop an identity. Common Core avoids “cultural bias” by discouraging the development of a patriotic attachment to the nation state.

International student testing materials encourage this trend. The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) is administered to 15 year-old students every three years in most of the world’s developed nations. The PISA standings drive text selection for reading literacy. To avoid cultural bias, PISA defines literacy as the ability to read the material required for workplace proficiency, rather than works of literature.

Therefore, utilitarian texts, such as EPA manuals and assembly instructions account for fifty percent of reading assignments under the CCSS. Students are deprived of decent grounding in the great works of literature. As a result, students are less likely to appreciate the cultural heritage of the West. It’s difficult to conceive of a student learning virtue, self-sacrifice, courage, perseverance, mercy, regret or triumph by reading maintenance manuals. There is more to good citizenship than “workplace proficiency.”

Yet, CCSS promoters insist that citizenship is addressed. For example, the New York State Common Core Social Studies Framework states:

The primary purpose of Social Studies is to help young people develop the ability to make informed and reasoned decisions for the public good as citizens of a culturally diverse, democratic society in an interdependent world.

This sounds reasonable enough to the casual reader. A deeper examination must match this rationale with the actual content of texts and tests. Then it becomes clear that the language of the rationale holds different meanings to those who designed the texts and tests with an agenda in mind.

An iconic example of this tactic is at the United Nations where the stealth phrase “health and reproductive rights” seems to promise decent prenatal care. Nothing in the phrase suggests abortion and sterilization, but those are the intended “rights.” Thus, in the New York framework, the word “informed” should prompt the question, “informed with what information?” And the phrase “public good” must answer “whose definition of public good?” Is same-sex parenting a public good? And what of the phrase, “culturally diverse, democratic society in an interdependent world?” Should we be comfortable with a goal that fails to emphasize American cultural achievements, American citizenship, American constitutional principles and civic virtues? Or do we realize that the “framework” reorients students toward the vision of a secular, globalist humanism?

It appears that few recognize this gambit under the guise of education for “job security” in the global economy. If it is a globalized world, the reasoning goes, then blurring the lines of culture and country must be achieved in order to insure a cooperative workforce with fewer cultural divisions or religious tensions. A tractable workforce asks no questions because it has no foundation of knowledge from which to form the questions.

Common Core is the latest blueprint for a techno-serfdom, workers managed for the global economy. Student and teacher are transformed indeed—into utilitarian tools of global commerce: The student is a product, schools are processing plants, and teachers are information delivery agents. The socialist “workforce management” scheme is the inverse of American principles where free persons find their own vocation and pursue it according to their talents. The “workforce” model believes that the state can anticipate the workforce needs of the economy, then train workers “cradle to career.”

Common Core is part of the subterranean template in place to indoctrinate our society into accepting “workforce security” in exchange for a global public square where American values are a distant memory, and Christian, especially Catholic, practice is confined behind church doors. Perhaps with an awareness of this abandonment of fidelity to particular national values in the face of globalizing pressures, Pope Francis this week warned against worldly “hegemonic uniformity”: “And this is the fruit of the devil, the prince of this world, who leads us forward with the spirit of worldliness…. They accepted the habits of the pagan … that all should be one people, and everyone would abandon their customs. A globalizing conformity of all nations is not beautiful” since “it is the hegemonic uniformity of globalization, the single line of thought” rather than a unity of nations each with its own unique customs and traditions that make up a particular civilization. If education is reduced to job training, the consequences will be tragic. As C. S. Lewis reminds us, “If education is beaten by training, civilization dies … civilization is a rarity, attained with difficulty and easily lost.”

Mary Jo Anderson is a Catholic journalist and public speaker. She has been a frequent guest on "Abundant Life," an EWTN television program, and her "Global Watch" radio program is heard on EWTN radio affiliates nationwide. She writes regularly for Crisis Magazine. More articles and commentary can be found at Properly Scared and at Women for Faith and Family. Mary Jo is a board member of Women for Faith and Family and has served on the Legatus Board of Directors. With co-author Robin Bernhoft, she wrote "Male and Female He Made Them: Questions and Answers about Marriage and Same-Sex Unions," published in 2005 by Catholic Answers. In 2003 Mary Jo was invited to the Czech Republic to address parliamentarians on the Impact of Radical Feminism on Emerging Democracies.

Subscribe to Crisis

(It’s Free)

Daily

Weekly

More on Crisis

Our so-proclaimed “ruling elites”…in tandem with their selected counterparts around the world….aim to have the American people in harness and on our knees shortly. When the president bowdlerizes Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address to erase God, the picture becomes crystal clear.

Sherry

Thank you, Mary Jo, for this outstanding, comprehensive overview. Hopefully, readers will share it with as many as possible so people are able to better understand the implications for our future and to be able to take action before it is too late.

We will need to think of creative ways to get people’s attention. Since people are into “entertainment”, maybe novels and movies would be a way to lay the groundwork so they have a better idea of where all this is leading.

Our book group recently read “Brave New World” by Aldous Huxley. Although many of us had read it years ago, it had new meaning in today’s scientific and political, and educational environment.

Also, a book that I believe was written in 1907, “Lord of the World” by Robert Hugh Benson, describes a future that sounds very much like “a globalizing conformity of all nations”. It is a chilling novel that helps to show our future unless we get serious about what is happening.

That’s irrelevant to our current predicament. There is too much time devoted to half-assed liberal education and insufficient time to vocational instruction. We need serious liberal education for those who can benefit from it and serious vocational instruction for the rest. The content need not be centrally determined and distributed decision making is a better bet for avoiding idiocies imposed by NCATE and other addle-pated guilds.

Everyone needs to know how to communicate effectively. Technical skills are not useful if you come across to employers and colleagues as suffering from asperger’s. And remember, the Common Core keeps the humanities (check out Prof. Elosen’s essay here), it just does an even worse job on them than the typical public school does now (quarter-assed..?).

Tony

Art — what every Catholic school should provide is deep and beauty-loving liberal education for everyone as far as they can go in it in their youth, and solid vocational training for those whose talents run that way. Farmers, miners, masons, and carpenters used to know poetry — because poetry until now has been the common music of all mankind, in every culture, in every part of the world, among people with writing and people without it. I know that we agree on first principles …

John Albertson

The Archdiocese of New York has imposed the Common Core on all its schools. At the same time this news item appears, making one ask what is the point of having Catholic schools at all if they are not Catholic:

CWN – November 19, 2013
A Catholic high school in New York has indefinitely postponed a
scheduled appearance by a priest representing Courage, the organization
that encourages chastity for those who are attracted to members of the
same sex.
Father Donald Timone, a spokesman for Courage, had been booked to speak
to an audience of parents at Cardinal Spellman High School in the Bronx.
But the school backed off the appearance, after a number of parents
protested, saying that the talk would be unfriendly to homosexuals.

Tina

Thank you for this article!! It is scary to think of the real motives and goals behind Common Core and other initatives. But, we as Americans, have to open our eyes and fight back.

It’s obvious that the ultra-rich know best, so we should succumb to their knowledge and whims. After all, we should only be educated in such a way that best serves the corporate interests and their place in the international structure and Common Core is the appointed way.
In the Forward to Captains and the Kings, Taylor Caldwell wrote, ” President John F. Kennedy knew what he was talking about when he spoke of the ‘Gnomes of Zurich.’ Perhaps he knew too much! Coups d’état are an old story, but they are now growing too numerous. This is probably the last hour for mankind as a rational species, before it become the slave of a ‘planned society.'”

cestusdei

Haven’t we learned yet that letting liberal secularists run the educational system is a disaster?

WRBaker

It also looks like the Gates Foundation has given money for years to the International Baccalaureate Program, as well as millions to the Cristo Rey Network.
Perhaps the question should be, where haven’t they?

R. K. Ich

It used to be the aristocrats had a grounding in the humanities because of their privilege and access to leisure and wealth. The noble aristocracy has vanished. Now we’ve got a cadre of utopian plutocrats who simply believe their lucre grants them sovereignty over the rest of us benighted holdovers of a bygone age. Mark my word, their god Tekne will consume them and spit their bones out on the same trash heap of history they vainly imagined Christendom would finally rot.

Albert8184

The aristocrats haven’t disappeared. They’ve just been placed in the background. And there will still be an aristocrat class, despite the claims of equality. And the aristocrats will be trained to rule the world in the new world of the future. There will be aristocrats… and there will be serfs.

Texas Catholic

I long ago gave up trying to even bring up American patriotism with my Sunday First Communion classes. Theyr’e not into it, even the second graders look at me like I had worms coming out of my head. They’re more centered on Mexico. They absorb it from what goes on around them. I decided not to waste my time. I will waste my patriotism on anybody who actually cares about this country.

Also,every year when I say that Mass in English and Spanish is the same, just different words, inevitably someone says “no it’s not the same.” You get the idea.

El_Tigre_Loco

Yes, but if you don’t tell the truth, you abdicate to the liars.

Adam__Baum

“They’re more centered on Mexico.”

It’s funny how many people want to be bi-locational.

John

This is all depressing stuff – and while you’re at it, have a look at what the International Baccaulaureate Org (IB) is doing to our children. More one-world global-citizen brain mush! However, I believe that -like all these great utopian plans made my man – it will fail too. Meanwhile, I’ll carry on homeschooling my 4 kids and talking about things like God, the wonderfulness of our adopted country (Switzerland), History and Great Books.

anything bill gates has his hands in you can rest assured is “one world”…….

Eric Johnson

This is so true! I am a teacher in the public school system, and they are working hard to indoctrinate teachers and purging what they call the “naysayers” who dare ask questions. Liberal teachers preach diversity as a good thing. The common core does not promote diversity of thought or free-thinking because it is limited to what they want to teach. Many teachers are unaware of the adverse consequences, do not suspect nefarious motives behind it, and just go along because they want to keep their jobs, even though they have concerns about it. Truly sad. Some day, we will be delivered from this and all evils. Have hope. Have faith!

tcdelfin

Its called just keep the trains running on time..but dont look in the boxcars…

BS

I agree. I teach second grade and have been more vocal about my dislike for the CCSS. But I am a parent, too. I am speaking up for others who are too afraid to do so.

dishatin

“purging naysayers”: heil hitler!

Michael Paterson-Seymour

They are rowing against a tide that, ever since WWII has been running in the opposite direction. Remember Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia? Then, we have seen the fragmentation of the former USSR, the autonomous regions won by Basques and Catalans, Flemings and Walloons, the movement for Scottish independence and, half a world away, the Tibetans and the Uyghurs. Everywhere we see the legitimacy of existing states challenged in the name of language and nationality.

mary jo anderson

Yes, they are rowing against the inclination of all people to be part of their own nation/culture. I am reminded of graffiti on a wall in Santiago, Spain: “Galicia no es Espana.” However, the “citizens of the world” believe that the technology and political mechanisms are in place to override natural impulse of those who would hold out for the sovereign nation state model.

Parsley

The UNESCO Constitution expressly cites families as the seed for nationalism, which to them was proven dangerous with the rise of Hitler in WWII. The Common Core curriculum has instances in it where parents are marginalized, this is likely intentional in order for the State to increase its influence our children.

There are many issues with this Curricullum being an assault against Motherhood and Parenting. I see this as a time for women to awaken to the “long con” of turning our attention outside the home for “economic power” and forgetting that the hand that rocks the cradle rules the world.

Women need to start their own businesses that allow them to nurture and support their families in a truly empowering way.

Czechoslovakia was an attempt to fuse many different peoples, who never regarded themselves as indistinguishable from each other as its architects had imagined.

Michael Paterson-Seymour

“Czechoslovakia was an attempt to fuse many different peoples…”

So is Belgium (Besides Waloons and Flemings, it has a German minority). It was formed as a confessional state (the Catholic South Netherlands) which has now lost its raison d’être.

The Dual Monarchy, too, was united only by the House of Habsburg, consisting, as it did, of the kingdom of Hungary (an ancient polity) and what can only be described as the Western Habsburg dominions.

The same is true of the Ottoman Empire, whose dissolution so concerned statesmen as different as Disraeli and Bismark

sue

Most of the world’s visionaries are being told by Jesus and Mary to beware of any kind of global initiation in any area whatsoever.

Parsley

I’d be interested in learning more. Can you share a link?

BillinJax

Elitists in education come in all colors and they have among them our own bishops who wish to display their “commonality” to the group in hopes of maintaining respectability and stature so precious to them. Raising their voices in agreement to world renowned programs in the name of educational excellence is worth the exposure but God forbid they ever dare mention school choice or vouchers. Their silence is deafening even as they watched the president remove and deny them from the poor black children in the failing schools of Washington D.C.as soon as he took office. Like so many Catholics in and out of government they view our faith not as a part of their “person and presence” but rather a garment to be worn at their choosing when convenient to their “prominence”.The Church, like Christ, must understand we will never be able to escape the Judas among us.

I never could understand why these billionaires want to push economic equality but don’t practice it by sharing some of their money with others.

mary jo anderson

“From the perspective of a humanity deprived of its soul and therefore deprived of a personal relationship with the Creator, what is technologically possible becomes morally licit, every experiment is acceptable, every population policy is permitted, every manipulation is legitimized. The most dangerous pitfall of this line of thought is, in fact, humanity’s absolutization: human beings want to be ‘ab-solutus’, released from every tie and every natural constitution.”
….The proper collaboration with international bodies in the areas of human development and promotion shouldn’t close our eyes to these serious ideologies. The pastors of the Church … have the duty of warning faithful Catholics, as well as every person of good will and right reason, against these tendencies.”
“It is, in fact, a negative tendency for humanity, even if disguised with good intentions, as a teaching of alleged progress, or alleged rights, or an alleged humanism… Certainly we must exercise a critical vigilance and at times refuse funding and collaborations that, directly or indirectly, favour actions or projects that are at odds with Christian anthropology.” Pope Benedict XVI CHARITY, CHRISTIAN ANTHROPOLOGY, AND NEW GLOBAL ETHICS
Vatican City, 19 January 2013

I just took my children out of “Catholic” school to follow a classical homeschool curriculum. We are in the Archdiocese of Cincinnati which has adopted the common core. There was no religion being taught to my kindergartner. They had a religion class once per week and this was a full day kindergarten. Religion was not integrated into other subjects. My 2nd grader was using all common core material and they had a religion class less than 5 days a week. Sometimes “religion” consisted of a word search put on her desk in the morning with religious terms. The last “religion” assignment she had was to find the terms “recycle, reuse, pollution, litter, etc, in a word search (at the top it said “Taking Care of God’s Creation”). Religion is not integrated into ANY of the other subjects at all. The curriculum is completely secular and not age appropriate. Why would I pay for this and have my children’s souls filled with this? It’s not a Catholic education simply because they say a prayer in the morning and before lunch. Besides the lack of religion, the quality of education was very poor. This is a vocational education with indoctrination thrown in. Where is the liberal Catholic classical education??
I also felt it was detrimental to my children’s faith. The straw that broke the camels back for me was when we were at Mass last Sunday. My 2nd grader did not genuflect and did a sloppy sign of the cross quickly and with an attitude. I asked her why she didn’t genuflect, because we ALWAYS genuflect and I explained to her the importance and meaning of genuflecting (though she has been taught this in the past.) She said they don’t have to genuflect at their all school Friday Masses, and so she forgot. My once reverent and faith filled daughter has become a different person in 10 weeks. I hope to bring her back to who she really is. Also, there are no religious books in the library (to my children’s knowledge) and all of the books they were read by the teacher were from the common core recommended reading list which included only very new books that I do not consider literature.
I was met with absolute hostility when I brought up a small number of these issues with my kindergartner’s religion teacher. She actually yelled at me for asking questions such as, “do you make the sign of the cross with the children before you start religion class?” The answer was “No, but you don’t have to make the sign of the cross to pray.” I was peaceful and just trying to understand what was going on because I care so much about my children and their faith. It has been a truly horrible experience. I am afraid of what will happen to our future Catholics.

Parsley

We are homeschooling our children as well. We enjoyed a few early years at private and public schools, but our enjoyment decreased markedly in 2011.

Our faith has been renewed through the process of homeschooling and spending time together as a family. It has truly opened my eyes to the damage that can be done in an “educational setting” to the values we want our children to uphold.

CatholicMom

I love your response here. I totally understand. Same thing here in Diocese of Columbus, Ohio. We’re homeschooling for the first time this year. Couldn’t stand seeing exactly what you described anymore…

Tried to talk with teacher (parent-teacher conferences and letters). Even gave her 6 books to read plus many articles on Islam when she was trying to teach about how great Islam is. (It’s in the 7th grade textbooks in Catholic schools). I’m sure I was considered the trouble maker.
Tried to talk to principal (1 1/2 hour discussion). Good man, but he doesn’t “get it.”
Tried to talk to Bishop (live on Catholic radio), but didn’t want to sound “negative” toward Catholic schools because non-Catholics might have been listening… He didn’t understand my concern of showing so many secular movies in school, while NO Catholic movies are shown…

I could repeat so much of what you said. It’s really awful that many Catholics don’t see it. Praying for what will happen to future Catholics, too…

Concerned and Watchful

Wow! I can really see this happening. I graduated in 1967 and started teaching in the public schools in 1971 as a substitute. With life changes I started again in 1998. The things students are being taught today are not what actually happened in world events. There is a definite bias toward making all into one. It really is like Animal Farm and Brave New World all rolled up in new Global thinking. Our president is really pushing for this agenda as are those he has chosen to serve under him.

Lord Have Mercy

One word: COMMUNISM !! Government control of how best to raise its (not your) children. Simple as that. If Obama is supporting it, it has its tentacles in fundamental communism.

jjjpraise

Well well it’s all going according to plan GODS plan that is no matter what we humans think GOD is in control so if you haven’t accepted JESUS Christ as your LORD you might want to do that he will be coming soon the signs are everywhere. It’s an amazing time to be alive Mathew 24 playing out while we live!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
GOD BLESS IN JESUS NAME

tcdelfin

Looks like they’re going to raise up an army of slave labor workers..

Maryvoneiff

OUTSTANDING AND COMPREHENSIVE. Thank you !!!! I have been researching CC for almost three years. This is best summative article I have read to date.

Elm

I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered! My life is my own.

NewHampshire

Good job! You forgot to mention Marc Tucker but we in NH already knew about him years ago.

While we can all question the value of education standards, there are a number of inaccuracies about the Common Core standards presented here. First, the CCSS were not developed by Bill Gates. In fact, the push for national standards has been around for as long as standards-based education (over 20 years) and was first advocated by the education commission created by Ronald Regan that published the landmark report “A Nation at Risk.” One of the key premises of that report was that America was losing its economic might because of poor and uneven education standards across the country. Since then states have worked hard to strengthen their standards as have Catholic schools.

The CCSS came out of a project started by the Council of Chief State School Officers and were developed by educators not government bureaucrats. In fact, the CCSS are based largely on the education standards of Massachusetts which are considered to be the most rigorous in the country. (MA students preform best in the country in national assessments and score favorably with students in the highest performing countries). These are basic math and language art standards that shouldn’t threaten anyone’s religious beliefs. They are standards only for what students should know and be able to do at certain grade levels. They are not a curriculum for teaching those standards. States and educators are still free to develop their own curricula or (and this is the big problem) purchase curriculum materials from the large education publishers, such as Pearson.

My guess is that Catholic diocese are adopting the CCSS because they think it is a necessary step in efforts to get more federal funding for Catholic schools. As we know, Catholic schools are closing at an alarming rate. The only way advocates for school choice will be successful is if Catholic schools can show quantitatively that their students are performing at a high level. The beauty of private Catholic education is that schools and diocese can do whatever they want. So the question for supporters of Catholic education is — should we stay independent from federal oversight and let the market determine which schools thrive and which close, or should we adopt certain national standards and assessments and access federal funds to invest in Catholic schools? Yes, with money comes strings.

As for the hand-wringing about the “global citizen” aspect of the CCSS, keep in mind the many of the highest performing Catholic high schools across the US and the world have adopted the International Baccalaureate curriculum which focuses squarely on educating students to understand and accept other cultures, to be “global citizens.” It goes way beyond the Common Core and folks don’t seem to complain about that. Remember that the Catholic church is Universal and the education it provides must inherently transcend national interests and boundaries.

mary jo anderson

Thank you for your response to the article. A couple of points. First, as to inaccurcy concerning Gates’ “developing” Common Core, I believe what is reported here is that Gates is a major financier, not developer, of CCSS and similar education programs worldwide. The globalist worldview has been well on its way for decades, as is outlined. Gates joined the ranks of many who came before him to bankroll, speed up, support and promote the specific philosophy detailed in the article.

Second, you are correct to note that the IB program has already been teaching this socialist humanism for years. The difference is that the IB program is a choice– families can choose this education program, presumably because they agree with its premise, but they are not forced to enroll their children in an IB school. Not so for public, and now, some Catholic schools. Where, then, can parents turn? CCSS, mandated in most states, represents a closed shop, is coercive. This is why CCSS is being fought in every state.

Cahill

Your point about choice is a good one for all parents, Catholic or other. But again, the advocates for “choice” in education push for policies such as vouchers and tax credits for privates schools, including Catholic schools. It is my belief that many catholic schools and diocese are adopting the CCSS because they know that accepting federal funds will come with the strings of accepting federal education standards. If the church or the Catholic faithful would support its schools financially they could easily stay truly independent and private. This is really an internal weakness within the Church than the result of outside global forces.

GET YOUR CHILDREN OUT OF PUBLIC SCHOOL AND DO IT YESTERDAY. Sell whatever you need to sell so you can stay home and teach your children. It is your responsibility as a parent and an American citizen to protect your child and our country. PUBLIC education is destroyed and it cannot be fixed. Until we shut down the US Dept. of Ed and all the other unconstitutional departments, withdraw from the UN our country will never be spared. It is our duty to get our kids out from under their grip. The day will come when children are taught loyalty to the government only. Not to God, family or country. Children will be taught to turn their parents into the government when they do not conform. Sound familiar. If it doesn’t then we are truly screwed. If you want to you will; if you don’t you will make EXCUSES.

It’s one thing to be informed as you have done your readership but what immediate, near term, and long term action can we take that is coherent, united, unified to rid our nation of this ‘global group think’? Thank you.

Mary Jo, Please mail a copy of this article to every Bishop in the country and also to their Superintendent of Catholic Schools. They need to see this! In the 70’s Catholic schools accepted funding from the Ford Foundation, today the Gates.

Thomas Barnes

***
“A nation is permitted to keep its surface culture, such as language, music, and cuisine. But patriotism, religion, and individualism are anathema, as each competes with the globalist vision of world harmony. Moral codes that cannot be adapted to a multicultural vision, agreed upon in a world congress, must be jettisoned. “ ***

I believe the reasons and futuristic dreams of Gate’s and those hoping to succeed with this
agenda are outline in the above paragraph from this article. Total mind control of the earths population.

How many reading this remember the old TV series “The Prisoner”?

From this same article; “Common Core avoids “cultural bias” by discouraging the development of a
patriotic attachment to the nation state.”

A plan to kill free thinking unless it is in alignment with the states agenda. It’s real scary knowing there are folks with this mindset pulling the strings of many in our government.

My question is “Why is a college drop out or someone who doesn’t hold a college degree out turned billionaire funding common core for a “work ready” force”?

Angela Stiens

I also pulled my children out of Catholic schools. The bishops here in Kansas were disallowing parents to opt-out of the CC aligned state assessments and the public schools are honoring the parents right to opt-out. Now what’s wrong with this picture? My son who is now in a public middle-school said the academics are all the same! I am doing the Seton home religion program with him and he said it is more than he ever had in the Catholic school. This “infusion” of faith into all subjects that our superintendents claim is nothing but a dream world. That would depend on individuals (teacher’s) all being solidly Catholic with AUTHENTIC Catholic teachings, textbooks, etc. Where are the Catholic standards, textbooks and resources? These “catholic” and yes a use a small ‘c’, superintendents are choosing to follow the secular standards and the coveted state accreditation here in Kansas. And where are our bishops?? That is a great question they have turned our schools over to these people and either have no clue what is going on or have bought into this machine. The bishops are NOT listening!! Our children have been entrusted to us, and if our bishops are not guarding the flock the laity have to do their job and should do regardless, parents are the first teachers. Sadly, all Catholic schools will eventually be government schools or charter schools (except for the independent ones) and we will have one ‘global’ view with no religion unless the people rise up! I don’t see our leaders doing anything soon, they either just don’t get it and I hate to say it but quite frankly I wonder if they care. Many parents here in Kansas are starting to wise up and are pulling their children out of the Catholic schools (because unless the diocese’ feel it in the pocketbook they won’t take notice), I do encourage parents to write to our Arch(bishops) but I still don’t think they are ‘getting it’. The bishops are only listening to there advisers (sups), they don’t know the everyday people and families, they don’t have the smell of the sheep on them! We all need to pray and fast fervently!

CKM

If the UN is truly aimed at peace then it would eliminate Common Core as it stresses 98% of kids to a breaking point in the 3rd grade and makes it to where there is no time for family or anything outside of homework. Stop the chaos!!!!! 1+1 will always = 2. Not this crazy borrow 10 take 5 minus 3 add 100 crap. Those who are rich and seem to be the true ones in power in this nation of ours need to go back into their safe rooms and let realistic people that have common sense not common core run the country.